Edmund Blunden

The Survival Poem by Edmund Blunden

To-day’s house makes to-morrow’s road;I knew these heaps of stoneWhen they were walls of grace and might,The country’s honour, art’s delightThat over fountain’d silence show’dFame’s final bastion.Inheritance has found fresh work,Disunion union breeds;Beauty the strong, its difference lost,Has matter fit for flood and frost.Here’s the true blood that will not shirkLife’s new-commanding needs.With curious costly zeal, O man,Raise orrery and ode;How shines your tower, the only oneOf that especial site and stone!And even the dream’s confusion canSustain to-morrow’s road.